Railway cars are widely used for transportation of goods and passengers throughout the United States and abroad. Railway cars generally include one or more truck assemblies including a plurality of specially designed wheels for traveling along a vast infrastructure of railway car tracks. Braking systems are generally disposed between adjacent pairs of wheels for facilitating the stopping or slowing down of the railway car.
Railway car hand brake assemblies may be provided for manually actuating the braking system of the railway car. The hand brake assemblies generally include a relatively large, rotatable hand wheel disposed in a substantially vertical plane, which, through a gear train, can rotate a chain drum in order to wind up a chain that is secured at one end to the braking system. Accordingly, as the hand wheel is rotated in a tightening direction, the brakes are applied, and conversely when the hand wheel is rotated in an opposite loosening direction, the brakes are released.
Certain hand brake assemblies further include a clutch mechanism for facilitating a quick-release of the brakes. The quick-release effect of the clutch is activated by a handle attached to an end of a shaft. Accordingly, actuating the handle may disengage the clutch and thereby allow for free rotation of the gear train to release a chain load.
Moreover, certain hand brake assemblies include a housing formed of a back plate and a cover plate attached thereto. The back plate and cover plate together define a cavity for the gear train. The shaft extends through an opening of the cover plate to attach to the handle. However, certain problems may exist with such a configuration. For example, the shaft having the handle attached thereto may receive a large amount of force during operation of the hand brake assembly. Additionally, due to the construction of the housing of the hand brake assembly, if one or more components of the shaft having handle attached thereto fails, the entire cover plate must be removed in order to repair the part.
Accordingly, a hand brake assembly that would allow for repair of one or more portions of the hand brake assembly without removal of the entire cover plate would be beneficial. Moreover, a hand brake assembly that could reduce the risk of failure of one or more portions of the hand brake assembly would be particularly useful.